Innovation and best practices for the Web

About this Blog

The blog is written by Brian Kelly. Brian is the Innovation Advocate based at CETIS, University of Bolton.

This blog functions as an open notebook which provides personal thoughts, reflections and observations on the role of the Web in higher and further education which I hope will inform readers and stimulate discussion and debate, both on this blog and elsewhere, including on Twitter.

Archive for December 24th, 2010

How do you get training in new (and not so new) standards? A good choice would seem to be from the organisation responsible for developing the standard. The following online course on the SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) may therefore be of interest to developers and others with an interest in this standard.

The W3C is running an online course on Introduction to SVG. Professor David Dailey of Slippery Rock University, Pennsylvania, will lead the course. The course will last for six weeks and starts in January 2011. During the first four weeks participants learn how to create SVG documents, to use basic elements to create effective graphics quickly and easily, add border effects, linear and radial gradients, re-use components, and rescale, rotate and translate images.

During the (optional) final two weeks of the course participants learn how to: add animation, use scripting to transform and manipulate images, and create interactive graphics. The last two weeks will most benefit those with some background in scripting. The only pre-requisite for the course is to have some familiarity with HTML/XML and the ability to edit source code directly.

I should add that back in November 2008 I asked the question Why Did SMIL and SVG Fail? but then in January 2010 asked Will The SVG Standard Come Back to Life? SVG initially became a W3C recommendation in 2003 but failed to live up to initial expectations. I feel that we often try to promote open standards too soon and early adopters can get their fingers burnt. However there does seem to be renewed interest in SVG , especially in a mobile context, so perhaps now, rather than in 2003, is the time to invest in training. After all, as described in an article on “Microsoft joins IE SVG standards party” published in The Register: “Commentors responding to Dengler’s post overwhelmingly welcomed Microsoft’s move, with people hoping it’ll lead to SVG support in IE 9“.